Burnsville school district cafe serves up business experience for these two student managers

Diego Alvarez's shift at the BEST Coffee ~N~ More café doesn't start until 8 a.m., but he always arrives at least 15 minutes early.

The snacks, from the cookies to the potato chips, must be arranged in neat rows if they're to inspire a sale. Someone also needs to give the counters a good wipe to make sure they're as spotless as they were after the closing staff left the previous day.

"There's a lot to do before we have our first customer," Alvarez, 19, said.

He's one of a handful of students enrolled in the Burnsville-Eagan-Savage Transition program — BEST for short — serving coffee and snacks to district staff for a few hours each day. The district's special education teachers and administrators came up with the idea of starting a student-run cafe when they were brainstorming ways to provide hands-on lessons and work experience.

Alvarez and his co-manager, Stephen Spofford, were two of the cafe's first employees when the shop opened at the district office last year.

The transition program is designed for 18- to 22-year-olds on an individual education plan where the primary goal is preparing them for adult life. The 46 students it serves take life skills classes and may embark on work-study projects to give them a sense of what it takes to attain and maintain employment.

Students needed a place to work on soft skills, such as working together and learning a routine, special education teacher Erik Chrissis said, and a cafe felt like a natural fit.

District officials provided space in the employee cafeteria, and the special education program was allotted a small budget to pay for coffee and a small stock of cookies, granola bars and other snacks.

Alvarez and Spofford, 20, took to the work immediately, Chrissis said. He and other special education staff regularly point to Alvarez and Spofford as the example of how other students should aspire to operate in the space.

"These guys have really been able to blaze the trail," Chrissis said.

It wasn't always easy. In the early goings, Alvarez regularly needed help counting change. The cafe only accepts cash, which pushed him to hone his math skills. Spofford sometimes found it difficult to keep himself busy — he'd finish a task and need help figuring out what to do next.

As time went on, Alvarez and Spofford started to get the hang of things. They called on Chrissis for help less frequently. These days, he mostly observes.

"They learned from the experience, little by little," Chrissis said. "Every week, they took charge a bit more."

Chrissis and the rest of the BEST program staff had always envisioned the cafe as a student-run endeavor. But it wasn't until the beginning of this school year that they considered having students manage it as well.

Alvarez and Spofford had proven themselves as employees, Chrissis figured, and elevating them might help them get closer to their post-graduate goals.

"I didn't see myself as a manager before," Spofford said. "But we got to know the ropes, so it made sense when they asked us."

The extra responsibility has given him and Alvarez more confidence in their ability to manage life after school, Spofford said. He found a job as a luggage handler for a Marriott hotel last summer and aspires to do the same work in a different setting: Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.

Alvarez isn't sure what he wants to do long-term. But his experience at BEST Coffee ~N~ More has given him an idea or two.

"It has me thinking I want to work at a coffee shop next," Alvarez said.